Did I take a long, painful flight for this?
by Charcoal love
Summary: A butterfly flaps its wings in one place and sets off a tornado in another, the tornado prevents a passenger of a transatlantic flight from reaching the airport in time and someone else gets his seat, that person flies off to Germany to attend the gala her father's throwing and that changes everything Fucking butterflies.
1. Chapter 1

It started-well, it restarted- in an airport.

Mila had been busy the whole month, she had papers to write and proofread, undergraduate papers to grade because the professor had plans with a prostitute (judging by the heels of his 'guest'), a debate to chair, tables to bus, counsellors to talk to and the list went on and on. Thus, she never really had the time to actually get tickets to Stuttgart and was stuck at the airport on the standby, hoping a flight, any flight, to the continent would free up and get her there in time for the gala.

The stupid, fucking gala. She hated it so much. Every year it was the same story, dressing up to be her Dad's arm candy, either get her cheeks pulled by those in the academia who had watched her grow up or get her other set of cheeks pinched by those who didn't and assumed she was the escort her dad hired.

Same old, same old, really, but it was important for her dad to get as much money as possible from them to fund his research and he always did better with her there to screw up and thus make him look better in comparison.

"Hey Dad," She said, mentally cringing at how much the phone call was going to cost her. "I don't think I can make it in time for the gala."

The steady stream of German was soothing and she almost fell asleep right then and there. He was yelling at her, sure, but it had been a very long few days and the airport chairs were terrible but still more comfortable than the second hand supposedly 'ergonomic' thing she had in her flat.

Still she wasn't going to act like she particularly wanted it all to be sorted out and be on a flight there. She wasn't exactly fond of flying in any way despite having done a lot of it since her parents decided to share custody while living on different continents. But her Dad wanted her there so she would be there. Priorities, Mila has them.

"I'm on standby, I'll try but it doesn't look too goo—"It was fate. Fate that had her bumped up onto a flight at that exact moment. "I got a flight, I'll call you later."

She was in luck, Lady Fate was looking out for her after all.

 _It wasn't actually Lady Fate, more like Ladies Fate but the Norns had been called worse. And they weren't looking out for_ _ **her**_ _as much as they were for another one, a favourite of theirs with dark hair, green eyes, and a wretched fate that they wanted to change._

 _Luck wasn't quite the word they'd use._

She walked through the crowds on her Dad's arm, half asleep. In twelve minutes, it would be exactly seventy-two hours since she slept. She never did learn to sleep on flights and after that one time a Santa stole the presents she was carrying with her she didn't sleep at airports either. She had landed, taken a train, walked, taken another train and then squeezed herself into an uncomfortable dress and pinchy shoes, slathered on red lipstick and was currently smiling the least fake looking fake smile in her repertoire, of which there weren't many. She usually wanted people to know when she was faking a smile so they would go away without her having to say it.

Finally, it was time for the speech. Her Dad looked at her for strength before tapping on the microphone twice.

Dork.

He started talking and the fake smile on her face turned real. He was good at this, sounding serious without being too serious and she could see the faces in the crowd nodding along. But before he got to the 'Give me your money' part of the speech, a shriek interrupted him. She hadn't even frowned properly when her Dad was being pushed and flipped over the weird stone altar and for some fucking reason the security wasn't doing anything, even the crowd edged away. She closed in on them, after pushing her way through the dense crowd trying to get closer. Just as she managed to shove that one lady in the golden evening dress who just wouldn't fuckign move to the side, the man with the bad hair who'd manhandled her dad took some sinister instrument out, clearly readying it to use on him and that was when she took the Walther out of her purse and shot his arm.

Nothing. It did nothing, simply bounced off him, the only thing that happened was that he actually looked up, surprised. Faster than she thought she was capable of moving, she stepped right into his personal space and pistol whipped him across his face and he crumpled, much to her relief.

Her Dad slid off the altar and pulled her away from the man, who for some reason still wasn't out yet and just moaned in pain. All around her she could hear orders being given to evacuate but she needed to make sure the man was really down for the count.

"Why won't you stay down you little shit?" She said, picking up his cane and swinging it down on him a couple of times for good measure before her Dad simply picked her off the ground much against her will and carried her out. A good few minutes of pandemonium prevailed and the guests rallied around one another for support, eagerly discussing what had happened while one of the medical doctors there attended to a security guard who had taken a hard hit to the stomach.

" _You_ ," Came a sharp, poisonous voice and they all turned to see the crazy man standing there as if nothing had happened at all, as if he hadn't suffered a vicious blow to the head and then to the gut. He looked straight at her and her Dad stood in front of her protectively which would have been a lot more comforting if she didn't remember that he was the one that Crazy Eyes had aimed for in the first place.

"Me." She said with a confidence she didn't feel and stepped forward, putting herself between Crazy Eyes and Dad, knowing that Professor Thackeray at least would hold him back.

"You have taken something that is not yours to _take_." He said in a low dangerous voice and she realised that the cane she had beaten him with was now a sceptre that she couldn't quite bring herself to give back or put down. "Return it to me."

Only she couldn't. For some reason she was being pulled on the inside in two different directions, the sceptre's yearning to return to him clashing with the sudden flood of possessiveness running through her, the likes of which she had never felt before.

Sirens interrupted her thoughts and she looked down the road to see cars coming towards them and thought quickly, hoping she could time it right.

"Come and get it yourself." She crooked a finger in his direction and he rushed forward with a snarl only to get blown away by the police car that drove into him. The crowd behind her gasped even as she smirked in triumph but it was short lived as he just brushed the impact away and stood up as if nothing had happened, like the villain of some b-grade slasher film.

The fuck was he made of?

It was sheer luck that he was stopped from making an attempt on her life when a man in spandex with a shield stepped in front of her and suddenly it wasn't her fight at all. Mila was left standing there as an apparent Captain America wannabe fought Crazy Eyes and then Iron Man joined in as well. It took a lot of snarling and fighting but finally they were able to wrestle Crazy Eyes into a jet plane and just when she thought it was over and she could finally go back home and sleep and watch all about this on the news later, Captain America wannabe stood in front of her.

"Ma'am." He said gravely."We need you to come with us."

"My daughter's not going anywhere with the likes of you."Her Dad said, outraged and pushed her behind him for what feels like the millionth time that night and if it wasn't for the fairly traumatic incidents of the night she would have died of laughter at seeing him being aggressive, he was just so very bad at it.

"Dr Schafer, it's for her own good."

"See now saying that just makes you more suspicious." Mila said and looked him over. "And you already look pretty sketchy."

He stood up straighter, obviously frowning at them under that cowl but the twin looks of scepticism didn't leave their faces.

"I'm afraid you don't understand, this sceptre needs to be examined and we need to make sure you weren't exposed to anything harmful when you came into contact with it."

"What do you mean?" Her Dad asked and despite hesitating the Captain America wannabe answered.

"The last few people to come in contact with the sceptre wound up mind controlled within seconds. You can understand our concern then."

Mind control. Not exactly surprising, brainwashing wasn't a new concept by any means but to do it via a sceptre and within such a short space of time. A couple of seconds he said and it didn't sound like a hyperbole. Mila opened and closed her mouth a few times before dropping resignedly. "Lead the way."


	2. Chapter 2

Fucking Crazy Eyes with his fucking magic and his fucking enemies that felt the need to drag her around with them. At least the Captain America wannabe gave her the time to go get the bag she'd stowed in the museum's safety box before leading her to the jet thingy but that just meant that a lot of people got a good look at her and she was sure to be internet famous in a matter of hours.

(Which meant that she totally won the bet she had going on with Claire, Mila knew she would be internet famous way before her)

"Tony Stark." Iron Man, who had dropped in just in time for the fight to be over and then pouted about the same, introduced himself as if there was even the possibility of anyone on Earth not knowing his name. She'd been to ridiculously isolated peaks without any cell phone service that knew of him. "I saw the security footage of what you did back at the museum. That was impressive."

"You should see me with a hockey stick." She rooted around in her bag and pulled the hockey stick she'd stowed in there just before reaching the energy bar, sleeping mask and noise cancelling headphones. The hockey stick went back in and she arranged the bag as she usually did in flight, under her seat with her feet weaving through the handles loosely. It probably wasn't safe but being in a metal container in mid-air never felt particularly safe either and this grounded her in a way nothing else did. She devoured the energy bar in a few quick bites and put the wrapper into her pocket for throwing away when she found a garbage bin and settled the sleeping mask over her eyes.

"Umm what are you doing?"

"I don't like flying and I have a migraine." She said candidly pulling one side of the sleeping mask down. "Also Crazy Eyes keeps on looking at me like he's a five year old and I stole his toy car. I don't have the patience for that right now."

Crazy Eyes snarled and just began to say something that was bound to be insulting so she just put the noise cancelling headphones on and relaxed as much as she could.

In her little sensory deprivation bubble complete with ambient music she fell into a lethargic state. She couldn't fall asleep, it was a psychosomatic thing she could never fall asleep when flying, but she was pretty close to it. The flight on the jet wasn't that different from one on a normal plane. There was some turbulence in between, she could feel the shudders in the aircraft but she'd been through worse so she just kept on sitting there, eyes closed, earphones on, willing herself to be as Zen as possible.

A tap on the shoulder snapped her out of it and she took the sleeping mask off to find that although they hadn't quite landed yet they've been joined by a tall blonde man with muscles bigger than her head.

"We picked up a hitchhiker?" She asked and when she saw the others she realised they look a bit frayed at the ends and all of them seem to have leaves and splinters in their hair except for Tony Stark but even his Iron Man armour was a bit bent. "You guys looked wrecked."

They stared at her in disbelief. Rude.

"Can't believe you slept through all of that." Stark shook his head and she looked around trying to figure out why he'd jerked her out of her nice meditative state.

"I didn't sleep." She said and leaned forward to see through the cockpit window to see that there was a gaping space in thin air where an apparently invisible flying thing had opened the doors to the hangar where the jet was going to land. "And my period of non-sleeping keeps on increasing. Great."

From one flying machine to another. Fucking hell.

With the slightest of jostling, the jet landed and immediately armed men began running up and down the deck of the hangar and Grapefruit Biceps pulled Crazy Eyes off his seat roughly.

"Loki goes first." He said gruffly and Crazy Eyes just rolled his eyes.

"Who's Loki?" She asked wondering if that was Captain America wannabe's name. His parents must have had a twisted sense of humour.

"My brother." Grapefruit Biceps said as if that cleared up anything at all.

"Right introductions, we didn't do those what with all the thunder and lightning." Stark grinned like a lunatic. Although that did seem to be his default setting. "That's Thor, Loki and Sssssteve."

"Named after Norse Gods and Captain America Wannabe has the same name as the original Cap? Weird little fuckers aren't you?"

"No, no, you misunderstand. They're aliens who live very long lives and are the real deal and this," Stark slung an arm around Ssssteve's shoulders which was not taken well, "is the actual Captain America."

Weird little fuckers did not even begin to cover it.

"Old weird little fuckers then. Even you're like forty eight or something right?" She asked Stark. The others didn't seem up to conversation.

"Excuse you, I am only forty years old."

She blew a raspberry and gave him a thumbs down. In her defence, she was very, very sleepy.

"I'm afraid I didn't catch you name milady." Thor loomed, clearly annoyed by her.

"That's because I didn't throw it."

"Why are you so grumpy?" Stark asked.

"I've spent seventy of the last seventy two hours on planes and the two hours I did spend on ground I was standing in these horribly painful shoes and beating up Loki before he tried something on my Dad, I've earned the right to be grumpy."

"Mortals, no stamina at all." Loki scoffed.

"Dude, look at your hair, you really think anyone's going to take someone with that bad hair seriously. Stamina my ass, you can't even control your hair" He glared at her but she ignored it. The doors opened and Thor and Loki walked out.

"The Winchesters looked more like brothers than those two." She muttered under her breath, so quiet that no one but Stark should have heard her but the two Norse Gods (ha, like she was going to believe that) turned in unison to glare at her. Her hand came up of its own accord, the one fingered salute proudly directed at them but only Loki seemed to understand judging by his snarl (he did that a lot) while Stark giggled (fucking _giggled_ ) next to her.

"Mila Schafer?" An armed guard asked.

"Yeah?"

"Follow me Ma'am."

"Do I have to?"

"Don't worry kiddo, I'll keep an eye out for you. I don't trust SHIELD as far as I can throw them." He squeezed her shoulder and left.

"That's so comforting." She muttered and followed the armed man anyway.

Which is how she ended up what looks like an isolation cell.

Oh well, at least she had her iPod.


	3. Chapter 3

Her shoes were off, her pretty dress was rumpled and she just laid there on the spartan bed with its scratchy blankets, leaning her feet on the wall, splaying her toes. The redhead pilot of the jet had offered her some pills to help her sleep which she had refused with a loud laugh. Because that's what she should have done when forced into an enclosed space at the mercy of people who were shady as fuck, take drugs from them. Quite frankly, it was an insult to her intelligence.

Still, for an isolation room it was surprisingly roomy. She wondered if Crazy Eyes— oh right, Loki—had this much room too. Although this room wouldn't be that much space for him really, he was a tall man...god? Alien?

It was time to do some thinking.

Events so far:

Gala was crashed by magical man using magical sceptre with magical powers

Magical man was doing something that needed her Dad in some capacity, or a part of him at least.

Magical man was stopped by her but also by a shady military organisation that she was guessing was SHIELD judging from the insignia printed on everything.

SHIELD had shown up barely a few minutes after the action went down.

Those were the facts but that wasn't all to them after all. The way SHIELD had shown up so quickly meant that they had prior warning. That meant they knew that Loki was at the gala and they knew that Loki was up to something that wasn't benign.

Loki needed something from Dad. Not his co-operation though so something else which was unusual. Dad was probably the best nuclear physicist in the world, people usually wanted him for his brain and that required cooperation. So something else then but it wasn't like the rest of him was that good. He kept in shape, sure, but he couldn't even throw a punch properly what good was he—

Oh. Biometrics. Loki was going to take Dad's eye out.

She should have hit him harder. And in the crotch. Fucker.

But she was here too presumably as a subject to study the effects of the sceptre. Understandable really because she had come close to losing control over her thoughts when it had been in her hands. The effects of the sceptre were related to the brain so they were probably comparing her brains activity to the scans she had taken for Arnav's project which would be on the university server. Realistically it shouldn't take too long but Loki was their priority right now, which meant that it would take time.

Besides, she'd seen some of the personnel here and recognised them from her early university days. They'd dropped out of Culver or been let go, either way they weren't exactly the cream of the crop so there would be a delay.

She was so bored. But she had a hockey stick and a ball, there could be some fun had anyway.

* * *

Tony hummed ACDC under his breath, idly watching the program do its work. Beside him, Banner was clenching and unclenching his fists, for a man who turned into a rage monster he was way more controlled than Tony ever was. Then again, to stay in the helicarrier he would have to be, wouldn't he?

Outside their lab, a group of SHIELD agents were passing them by talking fast with wild gesticulations and Tony wondered what they were talking about. A little command sent to Jarvis had the conversation playing back for him as they waited. Banner threw him a curious look but didn't say anything else.

"—I just calmed down and again, boom! The fuck is going on in the Carter wing?"

Tony and Banner exchanged a look but when he began looking up the Carter wing even Bruce leaned forward curiously.

In the Carter wing, in an isolation room Mila, the girl from the gala, was using the door as a goal. She hit the ball hard enough that it rebounded and she swept at it before it could pass her by, dribbled it before aiming it at the door again. It hit with a loud clang and outside the room the passers-by jumped at the sudden noise.

The loud laugh that escaped Tony got him more of a reaction from Banner than prodding him with electric shocks had done, the scientist jumping at the sound,a vein throbbing in his head.

He liked this girl.

* * *

"She moves forward, on the attack, will this be the nineteenth goal for Mila Schafer or the one that got away? She feigns right, moves forward and GOAL—"Her jubilant cry was cut short as the door opened and the ball hits a man's legs instead. "Crap."

The ball idly moved towards her with none of the momentum with which she sent it and the one eyed man glaring at her pursed his lip.

"I see you've been entertaining yourself."

She shrugged. "My iPod was dead and there's no outlet here for me to plug it into."

He breathed in deeply, leaning back. It was a surprisingly threatening move.

"Your results came back in, congratulations, you're not under any influence of the sceptre and you may leave if you wish to." She sagged in relief but it went away when the man smiled. It wasn't very genuine, this smile, and that made her tense up. "However, I would like to invite you to work with Dr Banner and Mr Stark. Your background in nuclear physics might help speed things up."

She tensed and thought it over. On the one hand, she wanted off this giant flying machine and she really wanted to sleep for a few days. On the other hand she might get a front row seat to watch Loki's plans turn to dust and maybe if she played nicely they'd let her rough him up a bit again.

"Would speeding things up make Loki angry?" She asked and her question took the man by surprise.

"And help save the world."

"But he'd be pissed off, foaming at the mouth?" The man looked taken aback by the hope in her voice, which was really just silly. A secret agent with one eye, something that had clearly happened in a near lethal accident judging by the spider web like scars radiating from under the eye patch, would understand violent vendettas.

"Yes."

She grinned, her smile probably reaching Grinch proportions in both, teeth visible and malicious pleasure.

"I'm in."


	4. Chapter 4

"Look, it's the Hockey girl." Stark said excitedly, grinning wide. She wondered if he was faking a smile or just faking faking it. Seemed like the sort of twisted thing he would do.

She liked him already.

"Stark, Banner," She nodded in succession. As a mostly unwilling prisoner she was as rude as could be but as a fellow research associate she was always polite and right now she was a research associate, "I hear you need a Nuclear physicist."

Stark pointed at her with a finger. "You're not exactly a Nuclear physicist though."

"I am, it's just not all I am. Got that degree to work with Dad for a few projects but biochem is more challenging and fun."

"It is?"

"Well, Dad already taught me about nuclear physics so in comparison. Plus when things blow up I just have to worry about third degree burns instead of a nuclear meltdown which turns cities into ghost towns, so there's that." Banner snorted and Stark smiled again. "So, catch me up."

"The sceptre is connected to another object, the Tesseract, which Loki intends on using for certain purposes." Dr Banner said as if that was sufficient information. A fair few moments of silence followed, Mila expecting some expounding on what 'certain purposes' they were but apparently none was forthcoming.

"What purposes?" She finally asked and the tow proceeded to have a silent conversation that she really wanted to be a part of.

"If Fury's asking her to work on this she has the clearance." Stark shrugged and she understood why the secrecy.

"He's using the Tesseract to open a portal that will let in an alien army from outer space to subjugate Earth." Stark continued. She blinked, taking her time to absorb this piece of information. Alien army. ALIEN army. Alien ARMY. Whaaaaaat?

"He needed the Iridium to stabilise the portal. When his plan at the gala failed they found another source for it, CERN reported their stash of iridium missing four hours ago." Banner elaborated in a manner contrastingly calm to Stark's puppy-ish excitement.

She nodded in understanding. "So you're tracking its radioactive tag?" They stilled and looked at one another which made the answer pretty clear. "So you're __not__ tracking its radioactive tag."

"That narrows down the parameters significantly." Banner said and he and Stark were suddenly in a flurry of activity. She took a look at the program they were running that they were changing now and realised they were just tracking it down by its Gamma radiation.

Noobs.

But that was fine, it wasn't exactly in their field. Except for Dr Banner that is, but she knew that he hadn't exactly been practising his art for some time now, he must have gotten out of date being on the run for so long.

"Jarvis is still trying to figure this thing out." Stark's eyes flicked to the sceptre even as his fingers typed out command after command.

"It shoots out energy waves right?" That was interesting but not exactly that interesting. The Iron Man suit's gauntlet did the same thing really.

"Loki used it to take over people's minds." Ah, yes, she'd forgotten about that bit. That was much more interesting. Also explained why she had wanted to hoard it like a child with a toy back when Loki'd demanded her to return it.

"So it's important."

"Very important."

"And Loki's plan will definitely involve it."

"Obviously."

"Huh. Hey Stark, I heard about the holographic projector of yours that's been making its rounds everywhere."

"So?"

"So can you make it look like anything? Realistically, I mean."

"Sure." He shrugged.

"And you can make something to mimic an energy signature too?"

He stopped typing and raised an eyebrow before looking back at the sceptre.

"I see where you're going with this." He snapped his fingers and pointed at her, very excited. "Once this program's recalibrated."

"Cool."

But then what was she supposed to do?

"The boys are excited." A very female voice said and she jumped only to find the redhead pilot from the jet at her right.

"I'm Mila."

She smiled like she knew secrets. It reminded Mila of her Mum's new girlfriend. "Natasha."

"Nice to meet you."

"Pleasure to meet you as well. That was some nice work taking down Loki."

Mila waved it off. She'd done worse to others in bar fights.

"Well that was some nice...flying of the jet." That was the correct response right, a compliment for a compliment? She wasn't really certain, not being used to compliments. Well compliments that came ina form other than 'Cute ass'.

Natasha raised an eyebrow. "You're not good with compliments are you?"

Mila shrugged. "There's always room for improvement, anyway."

"That's true," Natasha conceded. "Next time keep your wrist tighter and spread your hands further apart."

Useful information was much better than flattery.

"I'll keep that in mind."

"It's not enough is it?"

"What isn't?"

There was an entirely detached look on Natasha's face although she sounded oddly hungry. "Hurting Loki like that. You want to do more."

"Yes." She wanted to hurt him in his mind the way he hurt hers when he tried to take her Dad's eye out. She wanted him to feel that fear and worry, wanted him to panic. Wanted him to feel desperate and scared.

Twisted, yes, but then she wasn't exactly known for her magnanimity.

"It's your lucky day."

"Doesn't feel like it. But I assume this means you want me to interact with him."

Natasha shrugged. "People are sloppy when they're angry. You can make him angrier than I can."

"But I wouldn't know what I'm looking for."

It hadn't exactly escaped Mila's notice that Natasha was essentially talking about interrogating Loki. Probably to find out more about his plans but it wouldn't quite work because Mila didn't know half of what Natasha did and she didn't know what would hurt hi—

Thor. Thor would know. No one knows your weak spots like family, she kenw that well enough from the terrible arguments her parents had before the divorce.

"I'd like to chat to his brother before I talk to him."

Natasha smiled, all wicked and charming.

Seriously, just like Mom's girlfriend.

* * *

"Hello." She said softly, her talk with Thor having more of an effect on her than she'd expected. From within his cage Loki cocked his head.

"Strange."

"You were expecting someone else?"

"I expected you to be here earlier." He deflected and made a moue. "What took you so long?"

"I was talking to your brother." His jaw clenched. "Or _not_ your brother, it seems you've disowned him."

" _ _I've__ disowned him?" He snarled but pulled back with a strange look.

"That's the way he says it. Although I suppose since you introduced yourself as Loki of Asgard that's not quite how you see it."

He smirked and opened his mouth to say something but abruptly stopped and frowned.

"You...you pity me."

"You don't understand it do you? But then you wouldn't, you don't understand all the grown up emotions. It's all love, hate or a mixture of the two for you. A child's emotions."

Patronising people was something she was a natural in. Usually though, it was unintentional because she really was that much better than most of them and their ignorance was all kinds of pathetic for her to see.

"A child? _You're_ the child, you know nothing of the world."

"Probably but I know a lot about myself. I've lived and learned more in my twenty nine years than you have in your eleven centuries. It's sad." She cocked her head with sympathy that was heartfelt which always hurt people more than the mockery. He did seem the type to abso-fucking-lutely loathe pity.

"You dare—" He paused again and bared his teeth, running a tongue under them angrily. "You talked to Thor."

"Yep. The man's an open book. An open book that has many chapters all about you. According to him this all started because you found out you were an adopted frost giant and began thinking yourself a monster."

Tact had no place here, really. Natasha wouldn't agree but she'd asked her to piss him off. And personally, she thought she was doing a very good job of that.

"Me, a monster? Do you know even know whose court you're in? Fury who carries the mark of his sins on his face, Thor, the greatest war monger the Nine Realms have ever known, the Merchant of Death, The Black Widow with her ledger dripping with blood and then the true monster himself, hiding himself in the skin of another, __Hulk__."

She shrugged. "None of them are currently trying to take over the world with an alien army, that would be you." She tilted her head quizzically and frowned. "Why is that by the way?"

He stared at her for a second before rolling his eyes. "To teach mortals the true meanin-"

"No, not why are you taking over the world, why are you doing it with an army. That seems like something Thor would do, all battle hungry and tally ho. From what I understand you're not the type for a —"

"Fair fight?" He snarled and it was her turn to roll her eyes.

"No, the type to fight like this. Without doing loads of prep work, without any real plan beside breaking stuff. This isn't exactly a smart plan, it's an almost impulsive one, that's out of character. Only not really impulsive at all because there's an army waiting for orders." Sweat was beginning to bead on his forehead and she pressed on. "Without a backup plan in case the portal doesn't work, with only a rudimentary chain of command that is very dependent on that sceptre of yours. Flash and bang while there's no real substance. Weird, don't you think?"

His breath was coming in harsh breaths now and she ruthlessly suppressed the smirk that wanted to make its way out when his eye twitched at the mention of the sceptre.

"In fact while on the subject, where did you get the sceptre at all? Where did you get this army of chitauri at all? You fell into a Void, into nothingness, what could you have to offer the one who gave you such pretty toys?" She was asking with the subtlety of a battering ram, she knew, and so she wasn't surprised when the reaction to it wasn't subtle either.

"I am __really__ going to enjoy killing you."

"I am really going to enjoy watching you try and then fail." A rumble under her feet interrupted her gloating and it only got worse as he began laughing hideously at her look of alarm.

She threw herself against the wall with a shriek as fire erupted from the vent below her. "What the fuck was that?"

When her ears finally stopped ringing she heard laughter and followed it to see Loki out of the cage, suddenly helmeted and stalking towards her, almost happy. Troops poured in, armed and ready, and as Loki nodded at them two took hold of her arms and held her captive while another handed him the sceptre.

"This would be my army."


	5. Chapter 5

She didn't bother struggling at all. Mila knew well enough that she was strong but she was strong in the tackling a man down, illegal body checking sort of way, the kind that depends upon momentum and and anger, she couldn't get much of that right then. Even if she could she didn't really want to find out how it would work against people trained to shoot first ask questions later.

Which wasn't to say she was defenseless of course. No, never that, but she'd wait, she'd watch, find their weaknesses.

And _then_ she'd fuck their faces up.

"You know, I find myself feeling rather fond of you," Loki said, his voice echoing weirdly in the enclosed area. Only five of his henchmen were still there, the others having run off and two of them were holding onto her while the the other three were doing….something, she wasn't quite sure what, with the cage that Loki'd been in. "Mila, was it?"

"The feeling isn't mutual." He fiddled around with the control before stalking towards her and she stepped back making a moue, "Please maintain distance. The fact that you haven't bathed in ages is very obvious from the stench. Not to mention the hair." She shuddered, the moment tightening the guards' hold her arms but also allowing her to hide what she'd picked from her pocket.

"Pity that. We could have done great things."

"I've already done great things. And to be fair if what I've read in mythology is true then you giving birth to an eight legged horse...well that could be considered worthy of greatness too. Although a very different sort of greatness."

The barest twitch of his mouth revealed his annoyance with that and he moved suddenly, quickly and grabbed her jaw with a hand. It was unexpected even for the two thugs and their grip tightened before loosening up again while Loki loomed over her fingers pressing in with just a hint of pressure.

Her heart raced. She had seen that he wasn't human, his strength wasn't normal and it would take just a slight miscalculation on his part for the fingers to press through bone and kill. He held her life in his hand and it was a _terrifying_ thing.

"Would they fight _you_? You're not exactly one of them, are you? But then that just means they'd hesitate more."

She couldn't help the laughter at that. "You think too highly of SHIELD. I'm not nearly valuable enough for hesitation."

The hand that didn't hold her jaw threw the sceptre up and caught it in the same move, the point of it uncomfortably close to her and she hoped that Stark had gotten around to doing what he was supposed to.

"Well let's see about that." He said and lowered the sceptre to touch it to her chest.

Nothing. He was pouting almost and she was hard pressed to contain her glee. It may look like the sceptre but in his hands was her hockey stick made to imitate it. She knew what the head of it felt like its blunt rounded edge was what had brushed up against her, not the sharp metal of the sceptre.

"This usually works." He said, disgruntled and she couldn't help but laugh.

"Maybe if we dim the lights, turn on the Marvin Gaye, some candles, that might help you get it going."He glared at her and she grinned even more. "Or maybe it's decided it wants someone else to wield it. Does seem to have a mind of its own."

" _No_."She expected disbelief, rage even violence but the heartbreak, that was just odd. He was scared and desperate instead and it made her wonder. "No, no, _no_!"

Even the two guards holding on to her moved back, taking her with them, Loki's hysteria unexpected even to them.

" _You_." He hissed and she was reminded of when she'd taken the sceptre from him back at the gala.

"Deja vu-"

He grabbed her neck hard and threw her against the wall, holding her up with ease.

"Leave!" He barked at the guards even as she choked, her legs kicking out uselessly. Her hands came up to pull his fingers from her neck and in the process dropped the little glass tube she'd been concealing in her fist. It fell, rolling away only to stop at Loki's feet and he let her down just enough that she wasn't choking anymore to look at it. "Now, what's this?"

She mustered up just enough strength to push the toe of her stilleto down to break it and flung herself back as it burst into an explosion, throwing Loki back against the cage.

"Loki!" Came a shout and before she knew it Thor had manhandled Loki back into the cage, unfortunately along with himself and she sank down to the floor in relief, still gasping and wheezing for breath.

"Why do you heroes always have such shit timing?"

"Are you alright?" He asked from inside the cage still fighting with Loki and she had to be impressed by it really.

She lifted a hand, making a face at the cuts littering it from the small explosion but wave dit flippantly nonetheless. "I've had worse."

Mila closed her eyes for a second, tuning out their snarling and fighting and when she opened them again a SHIELD agent was squatting across from her.

"Do you need medical attention?"

"Need? No. Want? Yes. But I think we have bigger problems at the moment." Not Loki, no, he was being subdued by his brother well enough, for some reason not really moving now that Thor put his hammer on him. Strange, sure, but hardly the strangest thing she'd seen that day.

No, the problem was that they were very obviously losing altitude, even Thor and Loki's squabble being affected by the sudden shift in level as the helicarrier lurched to the side.

"This is Agent Coulson, detention level is secure." He locked and loaded the giant honking gun that looked like it had come straight out of a sci-fi movie and stood at the door standing guard and Mila whistled.

"Where can I get one of those?"


	6. Chapter 6

"It is just so satisfying to have the best ideas ever." Mila gloated as the real sceptre was taken out of her bag and the medic who had just finished looking over her, glared. Sure he'd told her not to speak because it would aggravate her throat which was ringed in red and blue from being strangled but how could she possibly not gloat? "Was I right or was I right?"

Stark sighed and rolled his eyes. "Yes, you were right but I did all the hard work."

"The only reason you had time to do all the hard work was because I pointed out that you could use the tag for tracking."

"That's not fair, it's not like _I'm_ a nuclear scientist." He whined and glared at Dr Banner.

"SHIELD's the one who brought me in, blame them."Bruce rubbed his head and the bit of green passing over his face passed quickly much to Natasha's relief. Apparently they'd ended up fighting for a bit before the Helicarrier had stabilised. In the scuffle the rogue agent, Barton something, had been knocked out by the Hulk and was recuperating nicely and informing them of all of Loki's plans.

"I'm just sayin-"

"Children, can we have order please." Fury glared down at them. "The portal is still set to go off on Stark towers and our agents haven't managed to break through the energy barrier surrounding it."

"What have you tried?" Captain America asked coldly. He wasn't a lot like the dancing poster boy Mila remembered from the old videos. He'd been nicer before but then again, he'd just had to work with Stark to get the Helicarrier up and running again. That would test anyone's patience.

"I could strike it with Mjolnir." Thor offered but Fury shook his head.

"Let's keep Tall, Dark and Crazy contained with it for now. No form of electric shocks penetrated the barrier and Erik Selvig has yet to wake up from his concussion."

"What if we just moved it?" Mila said and Fury fixed his one eye on her.

"Like I said, nothing penetrates the barrier."

"So just cut around it then."

"And then what?"

"No, no that could work." Stark had that lost look on his face that meant that he was off doing calculations again. "Stark tower is equipped with a fuck ton of weapons, we send them out into the portal before that army even comes in after moving it to an isolated place."

"Got anything nuclear?" Mila asked and ignored the perturbed looks that were sent her way for her enthusiasm.

"Nah, just Arc reactor fuelled bombs and stuff."

"Also one of the associate professor at Culver, Leroy, was doing some work on restrictive barriers, maybe I could contact him."

"You really think he could figure out how to break the barrier?" Fury asked.

"He could try and even if he doesn't we could set up a barrier to restrict the damage."

"Get on it."

Stark nodded thoughtfully. "Maybe some tracking devices, I'd like to know exactly where in space the alien army is coming from."

"That's it?" Steve said, looking rather put out, something echoed in Thor's expression.

Mila waved her hand flippantly intensely typing away into her phone with the other, her attention not wavering from it. "The thing in Stuttgart was enough publicity and heroics, now we just use rationality and science to solve the problem instead bludgeoning it and hoping that works. Finesse is more important than raw power anyway."

"Rhodey's on his way to the old PEGASUS site with the device." Stark announced. "The portal should be operational in four hours so we have till then to plan everything and move our arsenal."

"So, from what Leroy sent me, we might be able to penetrate the barrier with something that has the same energy signature." Mila said, still typing away. "Or it might end up strengthening it, do we take the chance?"

"Wait, Leroy? Lucas Leroy? He said that?" Stark's mouth dropped.

"God no, that man doesn't exactly talk does he?" It was an inside joke, one that Banner and Stark got immediately but the rest didn't and she tried to clear it up for the rest. "Leroy answers with equations, never words. Bastard."

"So we use the sceptre to break through the barrier?"

 _ **We could take it.**_

 _The stray thought had a frown settling on Mila's face as her fingers slowed down. There was an idea. She could go with the sceptre and try to break the barrier. It only made sense really, who else had as much experience wielding it except for her? She deserved it, after all the trouble they'd cost her and she'd get to get off this fucking flying ship and-_

"You okay?" Steve's face was closer than she'd realised and he looked over her, concerned.

"Yeah, fine. Just looking forward to all of this finally getting over." She answered, a bit subdued and shook it off and went back to talking to Leroy.

"Would work. I'd nominate Banner to do that, he wouldn't be that affected by the gamma ray emissions of the Tesseract." Stark said.

"I'm afraid that wouldn't be such a good idea," Banner protested in his usual self -deprecating way. "It...tests my control."

Fury looked over the room, his eye coming to rest upon Natasha. "Agent Romanov."

"Yes sir." She nodded sharply and slid out the room.

It didn't take long for it all to end. The Quinjet landed Natasha at the site a half hour later and by that time Selvig had woken up and confirmed that there he'd built in a safety, they could cut it off right at the power source. They waited, let the portal open up just long enough to send a tracking device in and then shut it off.

And for some strange reason, as Mila watched it form the safety of the Helicarrier, she got angry.

Very, very angry.

But now that things were finally calm, maybe she could finally go to sleep.

* * *

 _She was in that little passageway that lead to the cage Loki was being held in. Odd that, she doesn't quite remember getting there, doesn't even remember entering any of the passwords needed to open those doors. Why did she do that? Why did she walk all the way there in her bare feet especially when the medic had told her to stay off her feet as far as possible because of the cuts. How exhausting and yet she didn't really feel that tired. It was a bit distant, the ache and she was glad for it._

" _Mila, what are you doing there?" Natasha's voice echoed over the speakers. She must be the one watching over the cell._

" _Hello Natalya."_

" _What did you call me?"_

" _I think I got your name confused." Mila said only that didn't make sense either, how could she have gotten her name confused when it was so obviously Natasha. For a moment something loosened inside of her, something relaxed and as the tension drained out it reappeared because all that distant pain wasn't quite so distant anymore and- Oh, was everything always this blue? So lost in her pondering was she that Mila didn't even realise when her hands started flying over keys and Natasha's worried voice died off. What had she been saying anyway? Mila couldn't quite remember._

 _The doors to the chamber opened and there Loki was, still and silent under Mjolnir. How the mighty had fallen, so pitiful was the godling. He tried and tried but he kept on failing didn't he? How_ _ **pathetic**_ _._

 _Her fingers deliberated before pressing the dial that would open the doors. It was so very tempting to just press the red and let the cell drop out and take the godling with it. But that wouldn't be enough._

 _She stepped into his cell on silent feet and knelt near his head. He woke suddenly and snarled._

" _You." He spat out and she felt her lips stretch into a grin she didn't really feel._

" _You were told weren't you little godling that there would no place for you to hide in if you failed."_

 _She'd never said that to him. Why would she ever say that to him? She'd wanted him to fail, this was her world he was trying to take over why would she want him to succeed?_

 _What was going on?_

 _Loki paled, his eyes widening. She laughed but it did not sound like her laugh. No, none of this seemed like her._

" _It would be most poetic justice indeed if the little traitor was to die at the hands of his own weapon don't you think?" She said and her hysteria grew. She was trapped inside her mind while someone, something pulled her strings. Her hand drew a knife from Loki's sleeve, manoeuvring away from the cuffs carefully and held it to his neck. "How fitting that you were to bleed out to nothing under the ministrations of your coming of age gift. That One-Eyed fool spared no expense to get these Nidavellir daggers. Such pretty little things." Lightly she drew it over his cheek and watched the deep red flow out from that gash. "Did you think Thanos would be so kind as to let you go so easy?"_

" _It was your sceptre that failed me." Loki said and as the blood flowed into his mouth she could only watch as his skin flickered between its usual pale and a deep blue, eyes flashing green and blue and red. It was as unsettling to watch as was her lack of control over herself._

" _Foolish Asgardian. So easily tricked and yet you call yourself the God of Lies!" Such anger in her voice but she didn't feel it. No it was hers. The only thing that belonged to her was the panic, nothing else. "You shall be slaughtered. A fitting tribute to my Master's love."_

 _Her hand moved down now, holding the dagger against his neck and slowly began to press. The creature possessing her meant to kill Loki and do so slowly, painfully and Mila refused to be used for such a despicable thing. No, no one was going to use her body to murder anyone while she wasn't in the driver's seat. The flash of anger did something, something strange. Her grip on the dagger relaxed and for a brief second she could feel it's weight in her hand before control was wrenched from her._

" _Pipe down fool! This must be done." Her voice said and she knew that creature was talking to her not Loki. Her head ached as he intruded on her again and she used it, used the pain to fuel her anger again and drove the dagger into the floor beside Loki's head. The more she fought the presence the more it hurt, the more aware she grew of all her aches and pains but she didn't stop._

" _Get. Out. OF MY HEAD!" She screamed and dug her nails down into the floor so hard they broke, blood streaming from her fingers. With what little freedom he had Loki moved and head butted her hard. It loosened the hold the creature had on her enough for her to move back far enough from him. The little she could sense told her that the door to her cell had been opened and pain bloomed in her temple as the world went dark._


End file.
